“Call of Duty still plays in the realm of plausibility” after space-fuelled Ghosts trailer, says Activision

Call of Duty: Ghosts received a campaign trailer last night that opened with gunfight in space, as well as a kinetic blast from a satellite that ravages Los Angeles. It’s plausible and based on actual defence theories, Activision community manager Dan Amrich has stressed.

In his blog, Amrich said of the game’s ODIN satellite concept, “Telephone poles from space? It’s actually more science than science fiction. The concept of kinetic bombardment – nicknamed in the science and defense communities as ‘Rods from God‘ – has been used in sci-fi stories for years by authors including Robert Heinlein, Larry Niven, and Neal Stephenson, but it’s also been seriously considered by the United States Air Force as a military strike that could create mass devastation without nuclear fallout.”

Amrich then stacked the plot against real-world events and the concept of America’s own defence satellite, dubbed ‘Thor’, “In fact, long after Infinity Ward had committed to the concept for Ghosts, a thread about the USAF’s Project Thor showed up on Reddit in May of this year, which simultaneously made people involved in CoD feel good about their game’s fiction and a bit worried that the ‘catastrophic event’ might leak,”

“This was an eerie echo of last year, when President Obama started talking about rare earth minerals two months before Treyarch revealed it was playing a role in the story of Black Ops II. Say what you will about its over-the-top gameplay and action-movie attitude, but Call of Duty still plays in the realm of plausibility.”

What do you think of the Ghosts concept? Let us know below.

It’s out November 5 on PC, PS3, Xbox 360 and Wii U. It’ll come to PS4 and Xbox One in due course.